Across any nation, the Supreme Court holds the highest position in terms of legal decision-making. In case of Zambia too, the Supreme Court Zambia is the highest legal entity and as such, verdicts made by the court is generally considered as final and binding. The recent decision from Supreme Court Zambia was in a way beneficial for Dr. Rajan Lekhraj Mahtani, a noted businessman and philanthropist from Zambia. In their verdict, the Supreme Court Zambia rejected an appeal that was recently made by the Ventriglia family.
For more than a decade, the Ventriglia family engaged in a bitter court war with Dr. Rajan Lekhraj Mahtani over the ownership of Portland Cement Zambia. This cement-manufacturing factory was given to Dr. Rajan Mahtani owned Finsbury Investments via 58 percent shareholding. However, soon after this shareholding takeover, the Ventriglia family started a coup in which the shareholding agreement making Finsbury Investments the owner of the Zambezi Portland Cement was questioned. With political manoeuvres, corporate criminality as well as unethically influencing the law, the Ventriglia family were able to take control over the factory. This was achieved when the Lusaka High Court announced the Ventriglia family as the only majority shareholder of Portland Cement. Immediately after, Dr. Mahtani approached the higher Court of Appeal. On 31st January 2019, justice Mwinde on behalf of the higher Court of Appeal reversed the decision from the Lusaka High Court and announced Dr. Mahtani as the majority shareholder and legal owner of the factory.
After more than a 1.5 years of this decision from the higher Court of Appeal, the Ventriglia family once again registered an appeal at the Supreme Court Zambia. In their appeal, they challenged the decision from the higher Court of Appeal. However, the Supreme Court evaluated this appeal from the Ventriglia family and found that the Ventriglia family did not comply with majority of the legal and court requirements when making the appeal. As such, their appeal was effectively rejected by the Supreme Court Zambia.
,